Advent calendars are not just for kids! Instead of opening daily doors with pictures or retrieving small gifts or candies from pockets, adults and children can mark the day-by-day journey to Christmas by daily praying/drawing with a calendar template. When I draw, color, and doodle my own Advent calendar, I feel like I’m building something rather than tearing it apart. It is a countup to Christmas, not a countdown. At the end of the 20-some days, the finished Advent calendar is a colorful reminder of what was in my head and on my heart. It is a record of my spiritual journey through Advent.

Here are some examples of calendars from previous years:

Ways to use your calendar:
1) In a space or shape on the calendar, write the name of someone for whom you are praying. Doodle around the name, add color. Think of each stroke of color or each doodled mark (line, dot, arc, spiral…) as a wordless prayer. If words come to you as you draw and color, pray them. When you have finished with your daily entry, say “Amen” or a short passage of Scripture appropriate to Advent like “The Lord is my light and my salvation.” (Psalm 27:1)

2) Write and ponder an Advent word—prepare, await, hope, pregnant, watch, darkness, longing,…—as you doodle and color.

3) Since Advent is a season of hope, write something you hope for each day. Offer that idea to God as you color and draw.

Here are three Advent calendar templates in both .jpg and .pdf form. There is also a version of one of the calendars that is already doodled, so it is more like an Advent calendar coloring page. Click on the words .jpg or .pdf below the version/s you want. Download first; then print. I like to enlarge the 8.5″x11″ format to 11″x17″ card stock. It gives me more room to doodle and color and consequently more time and space with the person or word.

.pdf  or .jpg

.pdf  or  .jpg.

pdf or .jpg

.pdf or .jpg

Thanks to Cindy O for the box calendar template for 2015 and for her finished Advent calendar from last year. Check out Cindy’s blog called Mostly Markers.
Thanks to Connie Denninger for her finished candle calendar. Check out her blog called Vintage Grace.